Tag Archives: finance

A US bank chairman has pleaded guilty to using bailout money given to rescue his firm to buy himself a luxury home. Darryl Woods used $381,000 (£245,000) of the $1m given to his Mainstreet Bank to buy the Florida waterfront property. Following the US housing collapse and financial crash, Mainstreet needed to be propped up […]

A giant mountain of maturing cheddar cheese is to be used as security for a pension fund. Twenty million kilos of Cathedral City cheddar will now back up pension funds of workers at Dairy Crest, one of the UK’s biggest cheesemakers. Some 20,000 pallets of the cheese, nearly half the company’s total stock, have been […]

In a real sense, human history starts with the creation of a social surplus, a surplus beyond simple subsistence. Such a surplus could be used for–indeed, was required to–build more complex societies. This included the literal building of the monumental architecture, the most striking creations from the existence of such surpluses. More food, more babies Merely increasing production does […]

The Governor of the Bank of England has launched a scathing attack on “deceitful” investment banking and called for a “real change in the culture of the industry” stretching right to the top, in the wake of the Barclays rate-fixing scandal. Sir Mervyn King, who refused to back Barclays chief executive Bob Diamond, added that […]

A manager at US banking giant Goldman Sachs in London has quit, saying he could no longer work there “in good conscience”. Greg Smith, who headed Goldman’s equity derivatives business in Europe, said it was common to hear talk of ripping off their “muppet” clients. “The environment now is as toxic and destructive as I […]

David Cameron has promised up to 200,000 extra affordable homes and 400,000 new jobs in an interview with the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show. The PM ruled out a U-turn on spending cuts but denied he was “sitting back” in the face of economic stagnation. He cited plans to boost the “right-to-buy” in England and release […]

Italy has had the rating of its creditworthiness cut, the latest move in the European debt crisis. Standard and Poor’s cut its rating by one level to A from A+, and said the outlook remained negative. The agency said weak growth may limit Rome’s ability to cut state spending and bring its finances in order. […]

David Cameron says it is his “mission” in politics to make the Big Society succeed – amid claims it is being wrecked by spending cuts. The PM told social entrepreneurs the initiative would get all his “passion” over the five-year Parliament. The government has also set out details of how a Big Society bank to […]

A report into the collapse of Lehman Brothers criticises senior executives and auditor Ernst & Young for serious lapses that led to the firm’s collapse. The report says Lehman was insolvent for weeks before it went bankrupt, sparking a global financial meltdown. It accuses management of “actionable balance sheet manipulation” and using accounting tricks to […]